I have been field herping for as long as I can remember. Here is my "life-list" of species I have encountered in the wild under field conditions (not at a reptile show or zoo). These animals I have either

(1) personally caught,

(2) one of my partners beat me to it in a foot race, caught and "allowed me" to look at, !

(3) Observed (which really means you tried to catch it but couldn’t),

(4) found on the road dead (a.k.a. DOR) or

(5) hopefully photographed, I wish I would have brought a camera more often but wont forget it anymore!

If I could identify a particular sub-species that I encountered, it too is specified. I have added some notes and funny stories to a few of these.

Note to scholarly types: all names and subspecies were taken from my older field guides (for instance Peterson Field Guide Series -Western Reptiles and Amphibians, Robert Stebbins, 1985, to name one) which may be outdated, if there is up-to-date and current sub-specific changes please inform me (cbreps@aol.com), as I hope this list and accompanying photos to be informative as well as entertaining.

Thank You,

John Yocum

a cool (literally) and unexpected find while fly-fishing on a small "above the tree line" lake for golden trout that I backpacked to. I had to cross a snow bank to get to the spot I wanted to fish from and spotted and caught this frog amongst the rocks and moss.

a really cool little tree frog, we didn’t have much luck looking for reptiles while on a trip to the Pine Barrens but spotted this guy on the side of my friends garage as we pulled up to the house.

ok, Muriel found this little frog on our front porch and I took these pics and let it go. We identified it as the Little Grass Frog but when I read further in my field guide saw that it supposedly does not exist in Illinois

CROCODILIANS

on my first trip to Florida I hoped I would see one in the wild and within a few minutes of leaving the terminal in a taxi there was one cruising slowly in a pond on the airport grounds, it was the only one I saw.  

TURTLES AND TORTOISES

scuba dived with these on our honeymoon in Maui

I was on a family vacation at the Lake of the Ozarks when I was probably 5-6 yrs old when I found one of these eating chicken meat next to the camp trash cans.

Not sure which subspecies I keep seeing around the Chicago suburbs but I see a bunch.

I caught one of these on the same family vacation as the box turtle, only this was at a farm pond by using a fishing pole with a piece of liver.

see these basking along the creeks out in the country where I live. 

I found this guy while doing my morning reptile search while vacationing in Mexico, while the wife snoozed on til mid morning.  

LIZARDS

“Hey Brice wanna go on a chuck-a-waller huntin trip?” During a fly fishing trip Brice (a fellow deputy sheriff and now SWAT team member who insists I introduce him as such. !) and I took to the famed San Juan River, I talked him into (after I gave him several Black Dog Ales) making a slight detour up to the Glen Canyon Dam area in Utah on our way home to look for the Glenn Canyon Chuckwalla, what a trooper, not a reptile geek at all. We realized when we set up camp that there was a major party going on around us (very spring break like) and Brice informed me there was no way in hell he was going to walk with me with pillowcases and lizard nooses past the bikini clad babes the next morning! We left and found a less  traveled area but didn’t find any. Brice drew this cartoon and posted it at the jail where we were assigned to document the trip. I think he was suspicious of whether there was such a lizard until one day a couple years later on a four wheeling trip up a desert canyon trail I bailed out of my vehicle and scrambled up the side of a rocky slope and raised up a chuck-a-waller!!!!! His parents were in a jeep behind me and thought I lost my mind, ! Good times!!! Here’s a pic of Brice trying to mimic the lizard.  Here’s another pic of buddy James O. sneaking up on a chuckwalla at a different secret hunting location.

this was a really great find as this species is threatened. I was on an awesome field herping expedition with a couple good friends and a high school biology teacher that knew all the hot spots. While we fueled up at a gas station in Indio,Ca., I walked across the street and flipped a couple boards...and voila.....read more about this trip in my field herping section.

I thought I was the king of the world when I caught one of these at age 14, my mom had drove a group of us young herpers up to the high desert of LA County ,an area I later moved to and patrolled as a deputy sheriff. This lizard unfortunately killed a few of the lizards that he was temporarily held with on the trip home, I was unaware of this species taste for smaller lizards!

these are extremely fast and hard to catch. A typical noose using a regular fishing pole will rarely get you in range, I actually caught one one time by throwing my baseball cap ahead of it .....it ran under my hat and I dove on it!! Crikey!!!! Eat your heart out crocodile hunter!!

seen all over the beach and resort grounds on a trip to the Yucatan Peninsuala.

SNAKES

ok rosy boa experts I caught 3 of these in 2 nights on the same canyon dirt road, in an area....lets just say north of the city of Mojave. I will not give up my spot, ! I know that you guys break these down even further into more distinct "types", let me know if you have further info. Unfortunately a cheap thermostat killed these and several other breeder animals I had several years ago. Lesson learned...buy quality equipment!

a great first time pet! NOT!!!!!..I caught two of these and both bit me 5 or 6 times before I realized what was happening, go for the head and you end up grabbing somewhere halfway down the body!! Racer indeed!! On a carpool ride home one day with a fellow deputy, Melvin Y. on the interstate I started screaming to pull over. Poor Melvin didn't know what the hell was going on as I dashed out of his car. I grabbed the racer which was trying to scale a flat wall of rock and surprisingly doing a decent job of getting about 6 ft up before falling back, and trying it again. This snake bit me the usual amount of times before I gained control of his head. I walked back to the car smiling from ear to ear and blood coming from my hands. Now, Melvin is a Black city boy from Long Beach, and the absolute FEAR and HORROR that was in his face made me just bust out in laughter,  I jumped in the front seat and told him the snake was coming with us. Melvin was at a loss for words and figured he just better do what I was saying before I bled out. We released him down the road a bit where he wouldn't be trapped between two walls of stone, and I toweled off the blood. I would have given anything to have been a fly on the wall at the family reunion when he told the story of the crazy white boy and the snake! ! 

love these!!! Always caught the banded  brown and yellow ones around the Simi Valley foothills.

not sure of the sub specific identification of this one as apparently 3 different subspecies overlap in the area I found it. At least it appears that way on the range map I have. I found this snake at the far northeast corner of Ventura county, in the late 80's. Any help would be much appreciated.

LADIES AND GENTLEMAN! THE KING HAS ENTERED THE HOUSE!!! Big, powerful, great eaters, and tame down within minutes of capture (well one old/ scarred back/ rounded tail one bit me right in the shoulder and left teeth as I hoisted him triumphantly in the air to show my buddy who was flipping boards a short distance away. I think I was 12 or 13 and had caught several of these and all were very handable within no time, he gained my respect and never bit me again, but we dealt with each other very professionally after that, man was he a beat up 'tore up from the floor up' individual. I had a vision of a redtail hawk swooping down on him and this snake just saying 'oh yeah' and whipping around an giving the hawk a work over,! 

damn you John P. I wanted that snake!!!!!

I caught a pregnant female on a vacation trip to a beach house near Petaluma ,Ca. , in the mid 70's.  She  gave birth to 20 babies after I got her home. My first experience in the commercial aspect of  reptiles as I sold them to a pet shop.

varies subspecies of which I am not sure, I caught these all over California, mostly in the sierras, western and eastern slope, near Lake Arrowhead, in Ventura County, etc.

was bitten in the boot by one of these, luckily it didn’t go thru! 

almost was bitten by one of these as I stepped down on a trail and heard a loud buzz, looked down and realized I was about to land on his mid body..almost tripped as I did a sorta athletic hop, skip and a jump while carrying a full backpack. It was a full days run to contact help if there had been any kind of emergency and this could have been a  bad deal!  I was volunteering on a historical Bighorn Sheep Range survey along the Kern River in the Inyo National Forest (for possible reintroduction of captured wild Bighorn Sheep) with a wildlife biologist. Is it wrong for two men interested in wild sheep to go on a camping trip together?? ! I think not!!

The infamous and deadly Mojave Green. On a trip to look for snakes I ran over the first one I had ever seen on accident, he was right in the middle of  the road and I wasn't in slow hunting mode yet. I was driving too fast trying to get to my hunting grounds and when I saw him, I tried to put him right between my wheels but clipped his head. dohhh!! I still have that snake in my freezer come to think of it. What a bummer! Later, as a deputy sheriff,  working with a partner I screamed at Frank to pull over while driving through the desert. I bailed out and with my police baton caught  a smallish 'green' much to Franks disbelief of his new fairly 'new guy' partner. I went on about how deadly they were with venom that had both hemo and neuro toxin like qualities. He was the usual 'bored and could care less' Frank and told me to let the thing go, which I did.  I  got the last laugh however years later when I moved from California and Frank called me to get the wording right on the specifics of the venom. Frank had pulled over a car and during a search found a baby 'green' guarding a bag of meth in a fake stereo. Man those tweakers are something else, he even gave a great statement to up his arrest charges.

Buddy James O. caught and saved this one from certain death in a concrete flood control basin near the Salton Sea. This basin acts as a pit trap for many reptiles that fall into it and cannot get out.

we found 2 of these in the same basin and removed them, really cool little rattlers. 

a tiny rear fanged slightly venomous snake I caught in the Yucatan Peninsula